Car thefts drive increase in Danbury crime

DANBURY - An increase in car thefts and burglaries is driving a 5.7 percent increase in major crime in the Hat City, according to the police department.

Crime in eight major categories for the first 11 months of 2018 is up nearly 6 percent over the same period in 2017.

The statistics, which do not include December, contrast with 2017, 2016 and 2015, when major crime was down by double digits over the previous year.

Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton called the year-to-date statistics an anomaly.

“I wouldn’t call one set of numbers a trend,” Boughton said on Tuesday. “If a 5 percent increase was something we were seeing year after year, maybe that would be a trend, but Danbury continues to be a very safe city.”